I’m an ardent futurist. I believe that prodigious improvements that technology has provided humanity over the course of our existence will continue indefinitely into the future, much like the inevitability of evolution and entropy.
That said, I’m a pragmatist as well. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” are wise words to live by.
So, when I see an old standard, the preferred method of long distance locomotion for billions of human beings supplanted by new technology I start to take notice.
For the past year, after having moved out to brooklyn, I’ve noticed a trend among the deliverymen of our neighborhood: one by one they are moving to electric bicycles. At first, I thought it was a fad. Someone figured out that by spending a little bit more on their bike, they wouldn’t have to peddle all night long. I thought, surely this new technology, when faced with the rigors of delivery service would soon succumb to the more robust traditional human powered bike, with it’s easily repaired mechanical systems. But the fleet of electric bikes has only grown and surprisingly one model seems to have won out the in the selection of the fittest: the green power classic bike, which can be purchased for something on the order of 4 to 5 times the street value of a huffy.
Essentially, the benefits of an electric bike outweigh the total costs of ownership for delivering food, perhaps the most rigorous use case for a bike. This is a watershed moment for electric personal transportation revolution.
Here they are, in action:
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